


Faking It

by DracheBaum



Category: Norse Religion & Lore, Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Gen, Loki Does What He Wants, Lucid Dreaming, Pagan Gods
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-29
Updated: 2017-10-29
Packaged: 2019-01-26 05:56:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12550664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DracheBaum/pseuds/DracheBaum
Summary: Fai finds himself conversing with someone he had long ago forgotten.





	Faking It

**Author's Note:**

> Loki here isn't really intended to be MCU Loki, but I'm using MCU Loki's appearacnce. So I guess it's kinda him:)
> 
> The title and song lyrics are from "Fake It" by Seether.

_And you should know that the lies won't hide your flaws_

_No sense in hiding all of yours_

_You gave up on your dreams along the way_

***

Fai leans dangerously close to the precipice, contemplating the sharp craggy surface of the mountain reaching out like claws. That could do some damage, he thinks.

Snow crunches under his boots and he licks his lips, chapped from the forceful, icy winds that buffet at him and hold him back from the edge of the foothold just enough. Or perhaps just a little too much.

"Would you like me to give you a push?" the man standing beside him asks. Fai doesn't bother looking - he knows who it is and isn't sure how well advised it would be to look a god in the eyes.

Fai seriously considers it, before replying, "I'm afraid I'll have to decline. I have some things to see to, but..." he smiles. "Maybe later. We'll see."

In his periphery he sees the God of Mischief throw back his head as he laughs. It's deep and real and strikes Fai as the epitome of what laughter should be. "That was just a question, not an offer! Still, you lie."

"I'm not lying," Fai says. Right now, he has no reason to fear back-talking a god. What can possibly be done to him that he hasn't gone through before?

"That's the response of someone who is the only one fooled by his own lies. Please don't associate your affinity for lying with me. You're not very good at it so it's rather offensive."

Fai finds himself looking at Loki now. He finds himself incapable of  _not_ looking, when a god of his own world is standing here in the flesh. Even though this isn't exactly the same god. (That's how the multiverse works - Fai oftentimes wonders about his own other selves. And those of his brother. And those of Kurogane. Of how, maybe in another life, this is a happy story.) He's still the same Loki Fai prayed to, in an essential way.

The form he has chosen has longish black hair, strangely immune to the wind. His eyes, green like Sakura's, have more soul in them than any human could think to have. It's unnerving, to an overwhelming degree, yet simultaneously comforting. His smile says  _'I know something you don't!'_

"I had hoped..." Fai grasps for words. "I thought that, through you... I could have the strength to deceive the world. That's what I needed to do."

Loki sighs. "You thought of channeling strength from me, but there was never any intention in those thoughts. You haven't actually spoken to me in a very long time."

_No, not since I killed my brother._

"I didn't think myself deserving. You were the only god I was ever interested in. No one else was; the Old Gods were more or less forgotten. But I... saw my brother and I, just a bit, in those old tomes we found in a dusty corner of the library. But... after... I eventually came to think it was blasphemous, comparing someone like myself to a god."

"What's blasphemous is your ignoring me. Ignoring the things that make you happy, that's your biggest problem. It irritates me," Loki snaps. Fai doesn't doubt his irritation. He can feel it pulsing through the air around him like an electric current.

Fai sighs, smiling blankly. "I don't know a better solution. If I had done a better job of ignoring them, this wouldn't have happened."

"You continue to tell yourself that. It's truly just a paradoxical source of comfort. You don't know how to believe anything else, and you need to start learning."

Fai finds himself irritated. "I suppose it's easy for a god to say. Your horizons are much broader than mine."

"Horizons? I have no horizons. Take my advice and follow my example."

"I can't just simply take your advice, you know," Fai sighs.

"And yet," the god enunciates in a sharp laugh, "you call me here, after all these years."

He raises an eyebrow. "Did I?" he asks genuinely confused. He had experienced a tugging sensation, and inexplicably knew,  _'This is Loki.'_ He had not actually  _asked_ to be tugged.

"I wouldn't have come unless you wanted me to!" Loki says, suddenly quite cheerful. "You just like to have others make your decisions for you!"

"Well, I never seem to make any good ones," he grumbles.

"You base your decisions on the wrong things! To do the right thing, simply do what you want, because what you want to do is the only right thing to do. There. The answer to everything."

"Sure sounds nice," is all Fai can think to say. It came out sarcastically, but he didn't intend it to be.

Loki shrugs, and a lopsided grin appears on his face. "I may have exaggerated, just a bit. But maybe not. Whatever. At least you're starting to listen."

And then he's gone. He doesn't fade away or even instantaneously disappear. Fai has absolutely no words to describe it, whatever 'it' is. Some kind of god thing that he's better off not trying to understand, most likely.

"If you want me to push you, then I shall!" a voice, borne by the wind, calls out as the dream dissolves.

Fai sits up from the dirty sofa in the front room of their dirty (but relatively nice, compared to other places he had seen here in Infinity) apartment. Kurogane is standing at the window. He'll probably make Fai drink blood once he sees him awake, so Fai is reluctant to get up. But they are leaving soon. This was their last night here. They are scheduled to leave today. Scheduled to depart for Ceres.

As Fai stands, he sees fresh mountain snow on his boots, slowly melting.

 

 


End file.
